


Transparency & Accountability

by ckret2



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Rescue Bots
Genre: Fanboying, M/M, One Shot, hopefully this'll be a prologue to a slow burn but for now it's a one shot, less shippy and more prelude to shippy, to be clear this is Rescue Bots characters in IDW verse which is why both are tagged
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 14:41:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10969338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckret2/pseuds/ckret2
Summary: During the massive wave of homecoming neutrals, when a pack of ex-Autobot deserters calling themselves the "Rescue Bots" return to Cybertron, Prowl is none too pleased to see them. Surprisingly, one is pleased to see Prowl.





	Transparency & Accountability

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for fiveboos on tumblr. I promised it in December. Whoops. And now I've got ideas for a whole fic, I've written five other scenes, and I Know How It Ends, so this might be a long thing. For now it's a one shot and I'll leave it that way until I'm confident I can finish the whole thing. It's been a while since I've written solo fics instead of RPing. Set somewhere during the first few issues of exRID. There's a lot of implied worldbuilding going on in the background of this, feel free to ask me questions about it.

If one were to ask Prowl what he and Bumblebee were doing as yet another neutral ship landed in Iacon, he would say "Welcoming the new arrivals home." If one were to ask the new arrivals what Bumblebee and Prowl were doing, they would probably say "Skulking." Most welcoming committees don't lean against a far-off wall, mutter to each other under their breaths, and _glower._

But why bother getting closer? Metalhawk was taking care of the actual greetings. He was up front, all smiles, welcoming the neutrals home, making fifteen-second speeches, giving them directions. Prowl had told Bumblebee he should be doing the same, but Bumblebee had given him a Look so he'd dropped it. 

"How many do you think there are this time?" Bumblebee muttered. 

"Four hundred thirty-seven have disembarked so far." Prowl had kept count. "A ship this size can probably carry seven hundred." 

Bumblebee groaned. The back of his head thunked against the wall. "Do you ever find yourself resenting the fact that so many bots survived the war? I mean—I know, it's horrible. But don't you? Find yourself thinking about how much easier things would be if they'd all died?" 

"I'm not going to dignify that with a response." 

"So you do too." 

The corner of Prowl's mouth twitched guiltily. "Not dignifying that." Then he stood up straighter, gaze focusing on Metalhawk. "Incoming." 

"What?" Bumblebee followed Prowl's gaze. "Aww. _No._ " 

A blue mech, about Bumblebee's height, was talking to Metalhawk; he looked like he was probably some kind of car, but it was hard to tell these days. Many mechs had to do quite curious things with their alt-modes in order to blend in among aliens. The mech had black irises obscuring most of his optics that didn't fit any conventional Cybertronian aesthetics, but that appeared to be common among the mechs returning in this batch; perhaps this was one of the crews that had adopted a populated alien world as home and collaborated with the indigenous civilization, such crews tended to take on the aesthetics of their adopted homes. 

And the blue mech with black irises was glancing at Bumblebee as he spoke to Metalhawk. One time he pointed, and Bumblebee groaned quietly. "He's mad that Autobots are here. He's gonna come over and give us hell." 

"He doesn't look angry." 

"What do you know? You can't tell you're making a bot angry until after he's punched you to the floor." 

Prowl shrugged. It was a fair point. 

The blue mech turned back to Metalhawk, holding up a datapad, and Metalhawk nodded. Then the blue mech headed for them. 

" _See?_ " Bumblebee hissed. 

" _Smile,_ " Prowl hissed back. 

" _You can shove your smile up your—_ " Bumblebee forced a wide smile across his face. "Hey! Hi, welcome home. What can I do for you?" 

Prowl turned his attention to the blue mech—and noticed for the first time that what he'd initially taken as high pauldrons was actually an emergency vehicle light bar. Prowl looked him over again, examining the light bar and his body shape. Had he been an enforcer before the war? He looked like police. 

"Bumblebee, sir." The blue mech lifted a hand partially, like he meant to salute, but instead just held out his datapad. Bumblebee accepted it and powered up the datapad, and Prowl leaned over to look at it over his shoulder; the symbol that popped on screen looked like a silver Autobrand inside some kind of rounded casing. Maybe some sort of abstract spark chamber? Prowl didn't get art. "Chase of the _Sigma._ On behalf of the Rescue Bots, I would like to offer our services for the benefit of Cybertron." Chase, Chase—if he'd been an enforcer before the war, Prowl hadn't known him. The name was unfamiliar. But that was certainly a police-like name. 

"The 'Rescue Bots'?" Bumblebee repeated. "You're... soldiers? You use the Autobot symbol." 

Not the Autobot symbol, Prowl wanted to point out, since it wasn't red; but Chase beat him to it. "No sir, it's the First Face. The symbol predates the Golden Era and represents all Cybertronian people. It was adopted by the Senate and colored red to represent their government and the military and emergency services, but strictly speaking it's not an Autobot symbol." 

"... Right." 

"The Rescue Bots are a volunteer emergency response team that provides free assistance during emergencies. Law enforcement, firefighting, search and rescue, paramedical service, et cetera—" (Chase actually _said_ "et cetera," to Prowl's surprise and amusement) "—if it involves an emergency, we have a plan in place to deal with it and bots prepared to provide needed services." 

"Huh." Bumblebee stared scrolling through the datapad, skimming over the data surely faster than he had time to actually absorb any of it. "So you uh—this rescue stuff—you did this during the war?" 

Chase hesitated; then said, pointedly, " _Outside_ of the war." As if that wasn't obvious from the fact that he'd arrived on a neutral ship. 

Anger seized around Prowl's spark, tugging at the lines that held his body together, arms pulling in and crossing and doors going stiff. Oh. How nice. So they'd refused to fight in the war—the biggest emergency in Cybertronian history—in order to deal with _little_ emergencies. They'd spent the war getting to help and protect people rather than kill people. And now this Chase was _offering their services?_ Where had they been serving when Cybertron had needed them? What good had they— 

"I recognize some of these names." Bumblebee had found a page listing the members of the Rescue Bots. Prowl leaned over curiously to look; Bumblebee passed the datapad to him to read for himself. Blurr?? No, had to be a different Blurr. "Some of you were Autobots?" 

"... Ah." Chase nodded. "Yes. Almost all of us. We—" 

"Are deserters," Prowl cut in, looking up from the datapad to give him an accusatory glare. "You abandoned the Autobots." 

"I wouldn't say..." Chase glanced at Prowl, and visibly started. His posture improved and his irises dilated. "Prowl. Sir. I apologize. I didn't realize that was you, sir." 

... What? 

Bumblebee looked between the two of them, then addressed Prowl. "Wait, you know him?" 

Prowl's expression shifted from a frown of annoyance to a frown of concentration. He lowered the datapad and studied Chase, trying to imagine him without the black irises overlaying his optics and with a more Cybertronian alt-mode. No. Not familiar. 

Chase replied before Prowl had to admit he didn't know him. "We have never spoken, sir. However, I served under you during the campaign on Asseverette 20. Operation: Meteor Drum. It was my last campaign with the Autobots." 

Prowl winced inwardly; he heard Bumblebee, softly, say " _Oooh._ " Asseverette had been—still was, Prowl supposed, at least what was left of it—a red dwarf star system, orbited by dozens of objects that were barely large enough to count as planets, and by such dense asteroid belts that from certain angles the star was nearly invisible from more than ten parsecs away—certain angles that included Cybertron's. The Decepticons had discovered and been using the Asseverette system as part of their supply train, a way station between Cybertron and several of their Cyber-Outposts. A couple of spies had located the system and identified Asseverette 20 as their main base, and Prowl had been sent to lead the campaign to destroy the base. He had calculated—quite reasonably—that the easiest way to disrupt the Decepticon supply train with minimal risk to Autobot life would be to destroy Asseverette 20 from space. They had used an artificial gravity well to slingshot three asteroid belts at Asseverette 20. All without the main Autobot force ever leaving the safety of Asseverette 4. 

It was only after the gravity slingshot had been performed that Prowl learned a detail that their spies hadn't reported: the reason the Decepticons had chosen Asseverette 20 out of all the worlds to land on was because it was populated with a readily enslavable species to take care of the heavy labor for them. By the time he found out, it was too late to create another gravity well and divert the attack. Prowl had spent days hoping against hope that his trajectory calculations had been wrong—but, of course, they weren't. 

The Decepticons had seen the attack coming and evacuated two days before the asteroids hit. The Asseverites had been the first sentient alien species extinguished by Autobot hands—and Prowl had given the order. 

Little wonder that Chase had deserted the Autobots. Little wonder that he remembered Prowl so well. 

"I have been wanting to speak to you for a very long time, sir." 

Prowl could imagine. Well, he hadn't planned on being publicly humiliated by a neutral today, but he supposed he should have; it was well on the way to becoming a daily ritual for the Autobots. He mentally braced himself. "Then speak." 

Chase nodded. "I was stationed in Iacon, Precinct C-94, near Trion Square, while you were in the Security Forces," he said. "When you were campaigning for greater transparency and accountability in enforcers." 

Prowl's vents stalled. That was four million years ago, when the Senate and their Security Forces had tried to cover up and silence anything Prowl said about the system. Chase had heard about it? Chase had remembered it? 

He spoke crisply and quickly, as though he'd had this statement prepared for a long time: "Sir, the work you did and the reforms you proposed were phenomenal. I am forever disappointed that none of them were ever implemented. Just hearing your ideas challenged me to rethink the way I approached my duties and to hold myself to higher standards of conduct, and I am astonished few of our contemporaries felt similarly challenged. I think that in all my millennia as an officer of the law, no one has done as much to shape how I interact with the public as you. To this day, I consider your words to the press at the Austral Fordite Mines to be the foundation of my personal crimefighting philosophy, and I heartily recommend my recording of the interview to anyone else with concerns about how law enforcement should best engage with the community.” 

Prowl was dumbstruck. Optics bright, grip tightening on the datapad, tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth as thoroughly as if it had just been magnetized, faceplates possibly glowing as he continued to heat up from not venting. He didn't even remember that he _had_ spoken to the press at the Austral Fordite Mines. And still, Chase was—was... _beaming_ at Prowl? "Sir—it is truly an honor and a privilege to finally get an opportunity to speak to you.” 

Chase knew about all that? Chase—admired it? Respected it? Prowl had fallen from the most trusted enforcer under Sentinel Prime to mere theoretical statistics, lost his rank in the Security Forces, lost his respect with the Senate, lost all authority and credibility, because he'd dared to assert that the dealings of enforcers should be transparent to the populations they enforced. And somewhere out there had been an enforcer who _agreed?_ Who _still_ agreed? 

Even when Prowl himself didn't agree anymore? 

Bumblebee elbowed Prowl's hip. "... Ah." Words, words. "... I see." (Prowl could see Bumblebee shake his head in disappointment. What was Prowl _supposed_ to say?) 

"I won't take up any more of your time, sir," Chase said. "I only wanted to express my appreciation." He snapped off a smart salute. "I look forward to working closely with the Autobots again." 

Then he left. And Prowl was still there, faceplates still overheating, staring in a daze at Chase's back as he returned to the crowd. He'd admired Prowl's beliefs from before the war. Had he—had he implemented them? These, what had he called them—these _Rescue Bots,_ these emergency-response bots—Chase was obviously important in them, if they'd sent him to speak to Bumblebee; had he enforced the policies Prowl proposed in the Rescue Bots? Had they worked? Was there some tiny Cybertronian colony out there that had been made a little bit better because Prowl had—because Chase had— 

"Breathe," Bumblebee muttered. 

Prowl's vents roared back on. Bumblebee laughed. "Wow. What a bot. Can you believe that?" 

"Uh." Prowl was still running calculations on the probability that something like what had just happened could happen. All the results were coming back 0.00% probability. "... No. Not really." 

"Man. I didn't even _remember_ that you used to be all about—how'd he put it? 'Transparency and accountability'? _Pffft._ " Bumblebee's dismissive snort was like a dagger. 

No. Of course Bumblebee didn't remember. Nobody remembered. On the darkest days, at the lowest points in the war, sometimes Prowl didn't remember. 

But Chase had remembered. 

"What a weirdo." Bumblebee shook his head. 

"Mm." 

"Good weirdo, I guess," Bumblebee amended. "I mean, it can't be _that_ bad to have a stranger come out of nowhere and gush about how much they like you." Morosely, he added, "Wonder what _that's_ like." 

From next to the _Sigma,_ a voice drifted over the crowd. "Is that _Bumblebee?!_ " Bumblebee immediately tensed up. Prowl smirked. 

The source of the voice was easy to see; he'd started waving. A tall mech with an orange arm and half a dome shielding his helm. (Chase was standing next him. His helm and light bar were visible.) "It _is! Oh my gosh!_ " The orange mech's voice got higher with each word. " _Hi BUMBLEBEE! I'M SO EXCITED TO **MEET YOU!**_ " 

Under his breath, Bumblebee muttered, "Ssscrap." 

"Now _you_ know." Prowl stepped away from the wall. Enough skulking. "I'll leave you to your fan." 

"What?! Aw, no! I stuck with you when Chase came over to bug you." 

"He came over to bug _you._ " Prowl waved the Rescue Bots datapad that Chase had given Bumblebee. "You can handle the meet and greets." What few Metalhawk didn't take care of. 

Bumblebee slouched against the wall again, sulking. "Traitor." 

"I'll get started reviewing this." Another wave of the datapad as he turned away. Deserters and cowards they may be, but if they knew how to handle emergencies they might be useful. 

Besides, Prowl wanted to dig for records of pre-war broadcasts. He wanted to know what he'd said at the Austral Fordite Mines.

**Author's Note:**

> Guys, this is my first solo posting on AO3, I hail from FFnet. Is it still cool to beg for comments? I like comments.


End file.
